FRONTIERS OF ZOOLOGYDale A. Drinnon has been a researcher in the field of Cryptozoology for the past 30+ years and has corresponded with Bernard Heuvelmans and Ivan T. Sanderson. He has a degree in Anthropology from Indiana University and is a freelance artist and writer. Motto: "I would rather be right and entirely alone than wrong in the company with all the rest of the world"--Ambroise Pare', "the father of modern surgery", in his refutation of fake unicorn horns.

Wednesday, 27 February 2013

The following poll results are from Bigfoot Evidence. The original poll results table is on the left, my modification of it is on the right.

Basically I saw no reason for making the distinction between the first two possibilities and so I added them up (I also added my own vote here-total is now really 479 votes)
Also I tend to think that we have both a type of hairy man and a type of an ape (perhaps two kinds, but one is pretty obviously a standard ape) being called Bigfoot and neither one qualifies as an unknown at present. I count the Sasquatch as Gigantopithecus and that the Patterson film shows a female individual of the species: Basically I like to make a distinction between Sasquatch and Bigfoot but few others make such a distinction (Mark Hall tends in this direction) Gigantopithecus would be a survival of an Ice-Age species: and in all of the matters appertaining to Sasquatch I am essentially defering to Grover Krantz and letting Krantz have his say.

Darren Naish is to give a talk at the named institution in about a week. Further announcements shall be forthcoming.
The animal (fish) in the upper real prehistoric survivor, a coelacanth. The other illustrations are purported "Sea Monsters" and none of them are likely to turn out to be real animals exactly as they are shown here. They are all more likely to be mistakes

I am keeping out of the discussion about the propriety/impropriety of publication for the paper. I DO know something about DNA and the statements made on the subject in the paper are not really cause for rejoycing. However in this case, I am acting as reporter and posting this video from Bigfoot Evidence as pertinent to the discussion.

Tuesday, 26 February 2013

The Not Only About Nessie website is up and running, and the owner has linked up the page to the Frontiers of Zoology. I am adding the link here and recommending it because it includes some supposed photographs of the Loch Ness Monster's head and it definitely shows that the "Periscope" formation is a head and a neck and not just a long tail stuck up out of the water.

The above photos are from Nora's site and are being used to promote the site, with her permission.
The above photos are on her site at her discresion, but when I saw them I was reminded of a "Dinosaur head" represented on a wall painting at the Mayan site of Bonampak (Full painting plate reproduced above, closeup reprodueced below that)

And below the Mayan "Dinosaur Head" compared to Nora's Nessie. Looks like a pretty good match to me!

This is all part of the Appalachians of course and we actually have a number of plausible cryptids reported over the years. Bigfoot is of course the most common but we also have the Giant Sloth and a small hominid that is likely part of the Lucy lineage. These are the best suspects. It I have taken a lesson from uncovering the Giant Sloth is that it is way too easy to misidentify such a creature in a glimpse. However if it is in the fossil record, do not discount its presence in the modern era even if confined to a small range.

Here we have an excellent report of what I am suspect is the Giant Sloth. The second report is likely something we know and you have my guess of a tom cat. This is also not the first time that horns have been associated with the Giant Sloth. Otherwise the highly robust claws were observed and the visible fangs. Generally i am seeing the huge claws reported as confirmation and without them we do not have a Giant Sloth.

Confronting farmers tells me that it may have established its range locally and was taking advantage of the bounty. Then it possibly backed off or may simply know enough to avoid guns. After this story got around it is a surety that everyone began to pack. It is even possible that it was simply passing through to a remote range and we got the reports of its foraging.

It is most likely that this confirms that males do grow goat like horns although their size is not described. It also shows us that the creature can be opportunistic and must never be trusted. It may also be more of a daytime hunter than expected.For the moment, I am likely the only person out there looking for the Giant Sloth as a small subset of all reports. We alraedy have enough good quality reports to confirm that the creature is out there.

An ungodly looking creature created havoc among the local god-fearing Amish community. Witnesses described the creature as following: The size of a good heifer, gray in color with a white mane. It had tiger like fangs and curved horns like a Billy goat. It ran upright on long legs, and had long grizzly claws. In one incident, the creature sent a team of horses and two brothers flying when it approached their hay wagon. The following day, a man was cutting weeds on his farm about five miles from the previous incident when he heard a fierce roar and turned to see a monster with three horns and a tail charging in his direction. He raised his scythe to defend himself, only to have the implement ripped from his hands. At that point, the man wisely decided to turn both cheeks to the monster and escaped as fast as he could run. A day later a woman was feeding poultry on a farm midway between the two earlier incidents when she heard a commotion and turned to see the creature in the act of snatching a goose in each of its hands. She bravely ran toward the thing, waving her apron. The woman managed to recover one of her geese when the creature threw it at her, knocking her to the ground in the process. The interloper then escaped with the remaining bird in hand.

Source: Phillip L Rife, America 's Nightmare Monsters

[The subsequent report was not copied and pasted here because it sounds just like an ordinary but very large cat, probably a feral house cat. Robert Kline knows very well he is not the only one following such reports, he knows I have posted on the matter here before, and he probably should know that Ivan Sanderson, John Keel and Loren Coleman have all remarked on the earlier reports as well. The "Goatlike horns" are much more likely mistaken views of large pointed ears turned back-Dale D.]

I have posted several reports now about these lizard beings. They are all rather substantial in terms of detail and relay a tale of an evolved Terran race established on Earth for millions of years. This is a creditable proposition as even the fossil record supports that possibility. Almost all encounters appear either underground or close to such access.

It is relayed to us that these creatures reside deep underground in large formed habitats with ample access to the surface for rare intrusions. Again we are entering a future in which our mastery of material strength will allow superior underground construction. We do fine at present, but it is clear also that a lot better is plausible and desirable.

What we do get is rare close encounters and they will chase us off. In this case, they were surprised by the fire power and simply bugged out. That was the only rational thing to do.

Very important here is the description of the cave itself. The sides are smooth, with precise grooving and are tapered toward the top to distribute pressure. It is clearly a correct design model that we do not use at all because we still rely on blasting. This is completely new information.

Most certainly this entry was then open. The grooves would likely carry a blocking plug that was then retracted. This is again advanced methodology meant to prevent unnecessary discovery.

As an aside, way more data has been shared in a couple of separate reports than we have for any other oddity. Most important though is that they claim to be non alien and as mankind could also move underground if it proved desirous as our culture advances, none of this is unreasonable. My difficulty is that we have on hand several deeply detailed reports regarding several plausible scenarios that are best described as unique, unconfirmable (This one by way is confirmable and likely has been ) and way too good to be true. They all could easily have been lifted out of 1930's pulp fiction.

In short, they are stories that are too well written and that i could have made up out of whole cloth myself. you get the point.

During the past months I have collected anecdotes from readers who had personal experiences or were told of cryptids / anomalous encounters in Vietnam and other parts of Indochina. I received a particular narrative that was much different than the others that had been forwarded to me...so I decided to publish it separately. The post is a compilation of 3 emails, which included answers to a few of my questions. The man who provided this information was, at the time of the incident, a U.S. Army corporal...who has since retired from the military after a lengthy career. He did not give me specifics as to his unit and mission...but feels strongly that his experience should be told. He provided two identification references, which checked out. Overall, this man served a distinguished military career and his reputation is quite admirable from what I have seen. Some of the information has been edited at the request of the witness: [Lon]

In 1970 I was serving as a corporal in the U.S. Army – deployed to South Vietnam in an region about 30 miles south of the DMZ. At the time I was second-in-command of a squad of soldiers. We had setup a bivouac in a jungle area that had a few steep hills. That evening my section was ordered to patrol one of the small valleys west of the encampment. We moved out led by our sergeant.

Not long after entering one of the small valleys we detected movement ahead of us. It seemed to be scattered activity, so we doubted it was VC but we weren’t positive. We hunkered down for about 15 minutes getting occasional glimpses of something moving within the trees and brush. There wasn’t enough light to detect what we were observing even though the moonlight was bright that night.

After awhile the activity halted, so we continued to move slowly through the valley. As we approached a sheer wall on the hill it looked like someone or something had stacked large stones and boulders in the pass in front of us. There was also an opening in the hill side that looked like a cave entrance – approximately 5 foot high and 3 foot wide narrowing at the top. When observing the passageway, it appeared to have been cut away by machinery – the edges were smooth with small even-spaced grooves.

We were puzzled by this because we had never seen enemy caves like this –just underground tunnels. The sergeant suggested that it may be a VC supply depot, so we started to assess how we were going to investigate the cave.

About this time, things got very strange.

We began to notice a putrid odor emanating from the cave entrance –the only thing I can compare it to was rotting eggs and human decay. It was so revolting that a few of the soldiers were becoming ill and started to back away into the jungle – including the sergeant. I was directing a light into the entrance in order to observe anything, but there was a haze that was impossible to see through. We had no idea what was before us.

The entire squad took a position in the heavy brush approximately 150 feet from the entrance – far enough not to be detected but close enough to observe the cave entrance. We quietly remained there for what seemed like forever. The jungle was strangely calm though we heard rumbling sounds coming from the distance. It was really eerie. The sergeant was sitting near me talking to himself - it was obvious that he was frightened. I was looking at the rest of the squad –each had wide eyes and scanning the area. No one was going to doze off during this patrol.

After several hours, dawn was approaching and it started to lighten up. I checked my watch – it was just before 0500 hours. Just then we noticed movement in front of the cave. A being (I first thought it was a man) moved through the entrance into the clearing in front of the cave. As it stood up from a crouch it stood at least 7 foot high and started to look in our direction. At that time, another similar-looking creature was moving out of the cave. They were making hellish‘hissing’ sounds and looking directly at us.

The only way I can describe these beings is that they looked like upright lizards. The scaly, shiny skin was very dark – almost black. Snake-like faces with forward set eyes that were very large. They had arms and legs like a human but with scaly skin. I didn’t notice a tail –though they wore long one-piece dark green robes along with a dark cap-like covering on their heads. I never noticed if they had anything on their feet.

No one gave the order – it seemed like the entire squad opened fire at once. Every piece of vegetation between us and them was quickly sheared away. I yelled out a cease-fire order – at the same time I was looking in the direction of the cave. There was nothing there. We immediately checked our flank in case these things circled around us– but there was nothing.

As we approached the cave, ready to resume action if needed, it became apparent that the beings had escaped – most likely back into the cave. It was soon decided to set charges and close the cave entrance.

When we returned to camp we all seemed to be in a daze. There was little discussion of the incident and we were never debriefed – so I know the sergeant never filed a report. Then again, if he did, it was kept quiet by the brass.

NOTE: Well...I told you. None of the anecdotes or narratives I received match this one. But then again, I never know what will turn up in my mailbox. I look forward to receiving your well-written sighting and incident reports. Thanks...Lon

Michael Reviews Top 5 Bigfoot Photos of 2012

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

One of the photos above was viewed over 260,000 times last year. It's the number
one viewed photograph on Bigfoot Evidence blog. Can you guess which one? Continue HERE
Ev
idenc-My personal feelings are that the photos on the right are a hairy human above and a free-roaming ape below. The ones on the right I would call inconclusive unless new evidence comes along--all of them are probably real images but none of them Bigfoot and all of them have alternate explanations. The fact that I consider the photos on the left to be real creatures that are called Bigfoot and two different species does not mean that they are UNKNOWN species or suitable subjects for Cryptozoology. (The ape is more problematical in this regard)-DD.

Monday, 25 February 2013

It was described as: "Taironas,Pre-Columbian - a Reptilian God !!!????"Well no, the teeth are mammalian and the snake it is holding could well be intended as its next meal. Its way of squatting, overall appearance, drooping eyelids and bared teeth, are all exactly like a small ape: the drooping eyelids and bared teeth are a threat.

This male siamang is comparable to the gold monkey in question-the gold monkey's arms are not so long but the Siamang is burly enough to give a similar impression. The way the legs and feet are represented are very like the live animal. And the eyebrows and nose on the gold monkey are stylisations which do echo the siamang's features in an abstract sort of way.

The same creature would be the origin of reports of the "Male" Didis of the Guianans and parts of Brazil, which leave "Monkey tracks" said to be like the shape of a human hand. "Didis" are otherwise Wildmen although a legend has grown up that the footprints without an Opposed toe belong to an "All-Female" species (Ivan Sanderson reported tracks of the more humanlike kind and basically dis not know what to make of them, Heuvelmans reported the more apelike Didi tracks)

The Beast of The Forest of Dean in the UK is one of the stranger cryptids I have researched. There is not much printed information on the creature, but the legend stems as far back as 1802 in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire, England. When studying this cryptid, it should be noted there were no wild bores in England at that time. They were all extinct unless someone imported a large bore and let it free in the forest.

The beast is described as being very large, and is sometimes described as a moose with a pig’s head. Other accounts refer to it as being a very large boare with an unearthly roar. It was a powerful animal and was wreaking havoc on the local farmer’s land, live stock and trees. It was said to be large enough to push down trees, crush hedges, and break down fences. Finally, the villagers of Parkend decided to rid themselves of the beast and organized a hunt to either capture or kill it. The expedition was fruitless. They found no creature, track or trace of the animal.

There have been three reported sightings or events. The first was the event in 1802 that started the legend or myth. Something did ravage the live stock and created damage at that time. The next sighting was more recent in 1998. Two local farmers reported an incident where an animal resembling a boare, but as large as a cow, charged them from the bushes. They were able to escape. The most recent sighting was on 7 November, 2005. A young couple was on their way to Mitcheldean for work at approximately 5am. They stated they were near Pygmy Pineturn and Mireystock crossroads when they saw it emerge from the bushes. They described it as being the size of a large black dog, but it definitely was not a dog. It showed no fear of the humans.

In the science fiction realm, the beast was transported through a worm-hole and placed here on earth to guard an alien artifact. This makes for a possible good story, but it is not based on the actual legend/lore or fact.

Regardless, this Moose-Pig cryptid falls into our realm of Cryptozoology. It is worth noting and watching for any further developments in that area.

-The "Beast" is probably at base nothing more than a feral boar (Domestic swine) of unusual size and wild boar-like appearance, another Hogzilla (or a breeding strain of them) in fact!

Among other interesting points of note is the fact that unknown animals have been seen in the UK and described as "Moose-like" since 1802 it seems. That definitely puts a damper on the critics that say there could not have been any reports of moose on the loose in Scotland in the early 20th century.

And I have an interest in the following and shall update the information when the final statements are to be added.
In this current version of the theory, Plambeck is basivcally updating Mackal's theory to fit the giant salamander model better.He still says (as Mackal did) that the reports of the long neck must mean the tail sticking out of the water. As in the case of Mackal's original statement, this simply will not work because the head is definitely stated to be at the end of a long neck on several occasions.

I DO still agree that giant salamanders are found in the British isles including Loch Ness at least formerly: and in fact they are sprinkled here and there at various places all over the Northern Hemisphere (Which is to say they have a Holarctic distribution, as their Miocene fossil forunners also had) However the larger creature seen at Loch Ness does have the longer neck, as explained, and using Plambeck's reconstruction while switching the "Long tail stuck up in the air" for a long neck (With a head of this specific size and shape as shown below, also covered on this blog recently)
the end result is once again remarkably like the other standard reconstructions such as Dinsdale's and Sanderson's (Including my own, with pretty much the exact same specified dimensions):

I should reiterate that I have seen at least three different eyewitness sketches showing Views-from-above that exactly match the swimming profile in the bottom reconstruction. Tim Dinsdale reproduces one in The Leviathans (Monster Hunt in the USA)

The primary criticism I would have with Plambeck's reconstruction is that it unnecessarily differs from the known giant salamanders anatomically. Plambeck does have a good number of other points worth repeating and I hope to get to them in due course.

World exclusive – Justin Smeja of Sierra Kills fame releases a video at midnight detailing how Dr. Melba Ketchum told him to contaminate his Bigfoot steak sample from the Kills! She did so for unknown reasons, most probably so that other researchers would not use it and scoop her on the Bigfoot DNA story. It was a sleazy thing to do, but I think judging from the circumstances, Melba may have been right to make this morally dubious request. I detailed my reasons for that in the last post. Anyway, this is a blockbuster!
The story and video is on the Sierra Site Project website here.The Men In Black (MIB’s) may be after Rick Dyer’s Bigfoot! Texas authorities have noticed [notified?] Las Vegas police about possible criminal or fish and game violations involved in the possible harvest of a nongame animal by Dyer in Texas in September 2012. What all of this means, I have no idea. The people promoting the idea have sources on the SWAT team in Las Vegas and they say that Dyer is hoaxing. If Dyer is hoaxing, why is LE going after him. I hope the MIB’s don’t confiscate the Bigfoot, if it exists!Two shots hit Dyer’s Bigfoot. It now turns that Dyer fired on the Bigfoot two times, once hitting it in the back and the other time hitting it in the back of the head.Michael Merchant is doing some great Bigfoot breakdowns lately! I don’t really like his podcasts too much, as he tears apart everything and everyone, but his breakdowns have a whole different attitude about them. Michael is very bright and very funny when he is good.Michael Merchant breaks down Adirondacks Bigfoot.
This video has never made any sense to me. A friend of mine insisted it was a hoax, and the general view is that it is a hoax. However, this is one of the weirdest hoaxes I have ever seen, if it is a hoax. Look at the huge head! Combined with the small size. It could very well be a juvenile Bigfoot as they have gigantic heads.
Also the ears look exactly like Bigfoot ears, a nice touch that hoaxers almost never get right. It is bending its head back in a very bizarre way, but why would a hoaxer do that. And it goes down on all fours. Why? When do hoaxers ever go on all fours like that. It does look like a gorilla! Very much like a gorilla. All I have to say is that this is one of the weirdest Bigfoot videos I have ever seen!Michael Merchant breaks down Nassau Bigfoot.
I really do think that this is a Bigfoot, and it is definitely going on all fours.Michael Merchant breaks down San Juans Bigfoot.
This video is very strange and I cannot make any sense out of it. Whether it is a hoax or whether it is a real Bigfoot, I have no idea. The general view is it is a hoax, but that could be incorrect.Dr. Melba Ketchum told Justin Smeja that the Bigfoot steak from the Sierra Kills would probably test as “bear” if he sent it out somewhere else! Turns out that Justin et al did send it out elsewhere, and it did test as “bear” from two separate labs. What kind of sense does that make? It makes no sense at all! I am as confused as anyone about this.Ketchum is not hoaxing. One theory is that Ketchum has nothing but samples from known animals and that she has manipulated or misinterpreted those samples in some way as part of a gigantic scientific hoax. The problem is that that is scientific misconduct for sure if she did that. She would also be sued to Kingdom Come and she could be prosecuted by an enterprising DA for criminal fraud.
Ketchum is a rather shady person for sure (but many of the pillars of our society in business, entertainment and government are shady or worse), but she is not hoaxing. I do not believe that she is capable of scientific misconduct. She doesn’t have it in her, she doesn’t want to be sued and for sure she doesn’t want to go to jail or prison.
As far as ethical challenges, many of the greatest men and women in history had some rather remarkable ethical lapses, yet we still consider them great. Let God sort em out!
Another way we know she is not hoaxing is because I know that Adrian Erickson is not hoaxing. Erickson and his team definitely have samples from real Bigfoots. That’s for sure. If Erickson’s samples are real, then Melba’s samples are real. In addition, for sure Derek Randles and his team is not hoaxing, nor is Larry Jenkins, Mitch Waite, Alex Hearn, Stan Courtney, Larry Surface, Henner Fahrenbach, Rob Alley or JC Johnson. As far as the rest of the submitters, I doubt if most of them are hoaxers, but I don’t know them, so they might possibly be. We always have consider all hypotheses in science.Critique of Ketchum’s DNA study. Via Tyler Huggins on Bigfoot Forums, who sent the study to a PhD friend of his:

Huggins: I have another, and seemingly final update from my PhD contact who would prefer not to post here:
PhD: “What my analysis says is that the bear sequences are real bear and not just primate sequences that are homologous to bear. That means that a bear was involved. This is consistent with your and Bart’s reports. It also points to the fact that it’s inclusion in the publication was inappropriate, because it adds more confusion than clarity.
I think this is gonna be it for me on this sample. It’s fairly tedious work. It’s pointing to an artifactual mosaic due to the combining of human and bear sequences along with poor quality control of the output. Here is something that you can post:
______________________________________
Further analysis of the sequence associated with Sample 26 indicates that it is 2.7 million nucleotides in length., which is only about 0.1% of the human genome. It tracks from beginning to end with sequences associated with Chromosome 11. Chromosome 11 is 134 million nucleotides in length. So, this would correspond to roughly 0.2% of the content of Chromosome 11.
There are segments that identify with very high significance to Ursid (bear) sequences. One major limitation related to the analysis is that Genbank is fairly limited in Ursid sequences. Most of the Ursid sequences identify with Panda, but Panda is fairly well represented in Genbank compared to black bear and other bears. The Ursid sequences appear to be mainly from coding regions, rather than structural regions.
It is really impossible to compare the Chromosome 11 structural sequences (non-coding) to similar sequences for bears. So, it is possible that there are bear non-coding sequences, as well. This makes it very hard to decipher what might be going on in terms of the source of the sample vs. the contaminant.
So, are the bear sequences real bear or are they primate sequences that identify closely with bear. A distance tree analysis in BLAST using several sequences that identified as phosphatidylserine synthase-2 like coding regions indicates that the Sample 26 version aligns most closely with Ursid sequence (Panda). A primate cluster (human, gorilla, baboon, chimp, rhesus monkey) are highly homologous but more distantly related. Additional sequences from dog, mouse and galigo (Otolemur) were included as outliers and branch further away as might be expected.
So, the upshot here is that the 2.7 million nucleotide data set for Sample 26 is highly flawed, and, therefore, would be nearly impossible to use to determine whether a non-human primate contributed DNA to the sample.”

Ok, based on that, my reading is that Ketchum’s analysis of the Bigfoot DNA from the Sierra steak makes no sense at all. I do not know what that means. It either means that Bigfoot DNA itself makes no sense or that there was something wrong with her analysis.Craziest Bigfooters of all vindicated by Ketchum DNA study. Via this fascinating webpage of Ketchum’s very unprofessional website (my browsers warned about possible phishing sites due to improper certificates) we see a list of all of the successful submitters to the study. Many are rather unremarkable, but some do stand out.
For instance, Igor Burtsev, widely derided as a kook and quite possibly a hoaxer (he seems to have hoaxed a Bigfoot tour for Dr. Jeff Meldrum in the Kuzbass) nevertheless has 6 successful samples in the study, including one from Russia! 3 of the samples come from Tennessee (Apparently from the Carter Farm!), one from Michigan (Via Robin Lynne’s habituation site no doubt!) and one is from Russia (Which means that Ketchum’s study proves that Yetis are real!)
The Carter Farm is the site of Janice Carter’s story detailed in Mary Green’s book 50 Years with Bigfoot that details Janice’s growing up and living with the Bigfoots on her family farm in Tennessee over the course of a lifetime. It is widely derided as utterly ridiculous, in particular the parts about Fox the Bigfoot, and Janice has been proven to be a hoaxer, at least in part. In one scene, Fox comes to Janice’s door to ask for some garlic, which she gives him!
Janice herself has 7 successful samples in to Ketchum’s study and Melba’s page states that one of the samples was form the late Fox (Fox died in 2010) himself! How she figured that out, I have no idea. Yet the Ketchum study appears to prove that the Bigfoots at the Carter Farm, including the incredible Fox himself, were real, and hence Janice’s story, at least in part, is a true story! Holy Sasquatch!
In addition, Robin Lynne is Melba’s new spokesman and is widely derided as an ultra-kook even in Bigfoot circles. She says there are 10 Bigfoots living in and around her family’s rural property in Michigan. She feeds them fish and blueberry muffins! Once this story got out to the mainstream media, they all had a huge laugh about it. I even thought her story was insane, but apparently Lynne has a successful sample into Ketchum’s study, apparently validating that there are indeed Bigfoots living around her place and that her story is at least in part true. Holy Boogieman!

OK, Now for comments from DD-I think that the story Melba Ketchum has asked Smeja to deliberately contaminate the samples has arisen because the suspicion now is that Smeja's samples are already contaminated. This could be either Ketchum's actual request or Smeja covering his own ass by pointing fingers and making accusations.That the differennt law enforcement agencies are snooping around Dyerand checking out his claim means nothing of any especial importance, it need not imply there is an actual body involved: all there needs to be is the report of suspicious activity. Word has also been circulating that Dyer admitted to the hoax on an internet radio broadcast and Bigfoot Evidence has carried that story recently.HEREI do not endorse any of the videos, but I do not reject them all, either. I do endorse the idea that there is a large apelike creature present in North America, NOT a Bigfoot, which sometimes walks on all fours and which has been identified by Loren Coleman as a North American Ape or NAPE. Some of the reports are definitely runaway lab apes, Coleman has reasons to assume it is a native ape. My data tends to support the idea there is a native ape closely similar to an orangutan, and that certain photographs including the Florida Myakka Ape photos depict it. The "broken back" of the one video creature is very peculiar and I suspect a hoax in that case-from the jerking of the camera around more than the wierd appearance of the creature, actually.

Large Apelike creature in high weeds in US Midwest,

compared to a view of an orangutan from the rear second row.

Below are two extremes in colouration for the Borneo orangutans.

"Bigfoot up a tree, bear on the ground" above and

Below, closeup of the "Bigfoot"

Which also has an orangutan-like look to it

All photos are from Bigfoot Evidence and reproduced here under the terms of Fair Use.

That the anamolous and already-questioned genetic sequences from chromosome 11 come from bears contaminating the sample in Ketchum's study comes as no surprise. When the findings came out and said the results from chromosome 11 were not like other primates and were consistent with each other, bears were the most likely source of contamination and several commentators had guessed that is what the chromosome 11 results came from with no more information than that. I do not call Igor Burtsev a hoaxer for repeating incorrect information. There is a distinction to be made there, as to whether the misinformation was innocently repeated but incorrect or was maliciously manufactured with intent to deceive. The latter is what is actually defined as a hoax.

Reference to the Russian sample as a "Yeti"is misleading and mistaken. The mistake evidently arises because Myra Shackley said these Russian reports sounded like the Tibetan "Yeti" reports. Actually, "Yeti" is a generic term and does include some reports which sound like the Russian reports, but also other reports which sond like Sasquatches and once again, other reports which sound like orangutan-like apes. The term "Yeti" can equally well be used for any of several kinds of bears. In any event, the term is inappropriate to use for any populations living in Central Siberia because it is non-native to the area and native to Tibet.The Crazies included in Ketchum's studies were considered to be legitimate. I was given some of the hair samples supposedly from Fox at the Carter Farm: my samples were not analysed but sent away to the CFZ where the samples were discarded by mistake. I had heard that other samples tested out as 99.5% of modern Homo sapiens genetically but that the scientist who made the analysis at that point wanted all the glory for himself and so a dispute arose over proper credit. I was also told (through sources attributing the source as Igor Burtsev) that the DNA matched the DNA as taken from Khvit's tooth. I was quite happy with this result but it seems that this result was subsequently disputed also. I kept the documentation of these notices in my Yahoo Cryptozoology group Frontiers of Zoology. I became a sideline observer of Ketchum's study because I had a vested interest, and my interest was wholly in the DNA analysis and nothing to do with the stories told on the locations or anything else. The story was that Janice had tempted Fox to come close by offering him food and then snatched a handful of hairs off his arm when he came too close. Incidentally Robin Lynn is also a friend of mine on Facebook but Janice Carter has never spoken to me directlly, on facebook or anywhere else, she avoids me like the plague.I still hold to the information as it was given to me that the Bigfoot DNA is 99.5% of modern human and that it matches the DNA from Russia. My personal conclusion was, as I have subsequently maintained, that Bigfoot was classifiable as Homo sapiens by the DNA, but had some rather obvious external differences, primarily in having a hairy coat. I recognise the fact that the information given me that the samples were 99.5% of modern human were also possibly fraudulent but I have no independant reason to believe so other than the fact the hairs were said to have come from a Bigfoot. I was given this information via email and within the group Frontiers-of-Zoology, where the original messages remain, but I was never shown any hardcopy documentation (ie, published papers including the stated results)

I do allow that there has been local mixing of Bigfoot and Human DNA over time and in different places, and that interbreeding does occur. I do not say that Bigfoot came about from crossing two completely different species with Proto-Bigfoots being the fathers and European females were the mothers, as Ketchum does. Rather I say that they were Homo sapiens (Hairy phase) all along, and interbreeding took place because we were the same species. And that is going by the common taxonomic practice of including Neanderthals and Heidelburgers as "Early Homo sapiens". Ketchum's estimate of protoBigfoots diverging perhaps a million years ago makes no difference because that is still in the Early Homo sapiens time range (this time being the early Heidelburgers sometimes called Homo antecessor) and I personally consider that two species become distinct only once they get beyond that million years of separation mark.For a reminder: Loren Coleman and Patrick Huyghe's Field Guide To Bigfoot, Yeti, & Other Mystery Primates
Worldwide lists among the terrestrial higher primates covered in the guide the categories True Giant, Neo-Giant, Marked Hominid, Neandertal, Homo erectus, Protopygmy, Unknown Ape and Unknown Monkey. I would combine the first two in a general Giants category and leave off the Monkey category for the moment. The Homo erectus types are necessarily more comparable to Solo Men, and those are more likely another sapiens type than actually erectus. So those middle four categories are all Homo sapiens types and are not unknown animals, they are the same species as us! (The Unknown Apes are also mostly all varieties of orangutans, counting the ones outside of Africa only.)http://www.amazon.com/Field-Bigfoot-Mystery-Primates-Worldwide/dp/0380802635http://www.csicop.org/si/show/flawed_guide_to_bigfootAnd I reiterate: if Bigfoot (of the EASTERN US kind, which Coleman calls a Marked Hominid) is Homo sapiens, there is no reason to kill any of them to take any specimens. They are the same species as us. To kill one of them is still literally and legally murder. There are no big prizes to be earned, there is no new species and no new unknown species involved (This last statement is possibly even true of the NAPES, because they might be close enough to orangutans to be the same species: they could ALL be Apes Gone Wild from captivity)

Thursday, 21 February 2013

I am reprinting this here without comment or modifications from

Minnesota Ice Man - For Sale!

February 20, 2013 - 17:40 — Gordon

After a number of blog posts about Fortean property you need something to put in it. Well how about what is claimed to be Frank Hansen's original 1960's Minnesota Ice man sideshow exhibit? A snip at $20 000 on ebay.
The listing reads
"This is the actual sideshow gaff billed as "The Minnesota Iceman" byFrank Hansen in the 1960's. This is a one of a kind hoax that wasfabricated by a mid-20th century showman. The Iceman was featured in anissue of Argosy Magazine (as you can see in the pictures) and spawneddecades of debate as to its authenticity. For around 40 years thewhereabouts of the Iceman were unknown to the cryptozoology community.The "creature", while under ice, baffled the famed zoologist (andso-called father of cryptozoology) Bernard Heuvelmans who examined it init's heyday. Stories circulated as to the origin of the creatureranging from "a hunter shot it in the great northwoods", to "it waskilled during wartime in Southeast Asia", and even that it was foundfloating in the ocean encased in it's signature block of ice. It isthought that the "creature" was actually crafted by one of Disney'searly Imagineers. Regardless of who actually did create it, the qualityis flawless, and it has stood up remarkably well to the rigors of timeand repeated freezings. The chest freezer that it is housed in isunfortunately not operational at this time. It has been looked at by alicensed refrigeration contractor who determined that the compressorneeds to be replaced. A new custom sheet of glass was added in Septemberof 2012. The housing is extremely heavy, in upwards of 1000lbs, and isapproxamately 4' x 4' x 8'. This listing includes the rolling freezercontainer, the creature, and the original signage. Buyer will need toeither arrange to pick item up in Minnesota, or arrange for shipping.Follow this link to read the original Argosy Magazine article: http://www.bigfootencounters.com/articles/argosy2.htm Any questions, please feel free to email. Serious inquiries only. Thank You!"
So is this the real deal? There are other images at ebay to allow you to make up your mind. Was the original Ice Man a fake or genuine? Was it subsequently replaced by a fake and is this a fake that was associated with Hansen or is it a fake of a fake? Or a fake of a real animal? Or a fake of a fake of a real animal? Whatever it is it looks mighty impressive and I am searching down the back of the sofa to see if the Charles Fort Institute has enough money to buy it, but I'm not holding my breath!
For some excellent colour photographs of the beast Hansen showed I can strongly recommend L'Homme de Néanderthal est toujours vivant
And here is a composite photograph by Heuvelmans and two interpretaive drawings
Whoever buys it I hope it goes on display somewhere.

Wednesday, 20 February 2013

Above right, Zana the Wild Woman and at right, photo said to be of her son Khvit. Below, Myra Shackley's photo of Igor Burtsev with the skull of Khvit. All of these photos are from Igor Burtsev, reprinted by permission. Below Igor are two views of the skull.

There was some controversy about theskull of Khvit, allegedly the son of a local man and Zana, a captive Wild Woman in the area of the Caucasus mountains in the late 1800s. There were some statements that the skull had some Neanderthal traits, and against this the skull was said to look like n Australoid (Australian Aboriginal)
I could tell at once that certain specific features of the skull were Neanderthaloid and nothing like an Australian Aboriginal. Among these are the flattened vault with a low rise in back and low forehead, a rounded transverse section of the cranium, large rounded eye sockets and arched brow ridges above them, and the specific type of mandible with an elongated and backward-slantinting ramus in back (In many Neanderthals this elongation makes a considerable gap between the last molar tooth and the ascending ramus in the back of the jaw) Although the skull overall is of the modern human type, it has a distinctive Neanderthal appearance, including the view from in front and face-on.

It has been known for a long time that several of the earliest modern human skulls from the Mid-East had the look of Neanderthals crossed with regular human beings, and the example usually shown is the skull number 5 found at the excavation of the Skhul cave (Cave of the goat) in what was then Palestine. I would say Khvit was comparable to these Skhul crossbreeds in many ways. These men of the Skhul cave were tall, as big as Cro-Magnons and over six feet tall. It is thought that their increased height came about because some of the Out of Africa humans were also thought to be very tall, along the lines of the modern Watusi.

Incidentally one of the early types of Paleo-Indians had very large skulls and were identified by Neumann as Otamids. I have spoken of them before because their skulls had a mixture of Neanderthal and CroMagnon (Indian) features and they are frequently cited in stories of "Giants found in mound burials". They were the common type all over much of North America and even parts of South America until they were displaced and absorbed by more recent populations. But these skulls also have many of the same traits of Skhul and Khvit's skull. in the news article below a date of 35000 years old for the level of the burial had been suggested for this case, but the skull type persisted for a long time until very recently in many parts of the United States.

Petra co Oase "Earliest modern human in Europe" and Shanidar Neanderthal from Mid-East
As you can see the overall form of the outline is much the same and the two are doubtless related through some degree of intermixing. Below, the Shanidar skull from face-on view.

Actual anthropologial illustration of an Australian aboriginal's skull. The braincase is characteristically high and narrow, with a comparatively low and broad face. The top of the skull has a sort of a ridge along the top.The lower jaw does not have that peculiar elongation and slant to the ramus. Although the brow ridges are developed, both the brow ridges and the eye sockets are of the typical "Modern" form, as opposed to the Neanderthals where the eye sockets tend to be distinctively rounded and the brow ridges arched over them. (Compare the Shanidar skull above the two views of the Australian Aboriginal skull.) Neither Khvit's skull nor the Skhul skull had anything of the typical Australoid abut the,. Otamid skulls are also called "Australoid" in the literature and the use of the term is mistaken in those cases also.

Below, Night Cam "Bigfoot" photo from a facebook group clearly showing a creature with much the same kind of cranium as Khvit and the Skhul types. And below that, the reconstructions by Harvey Pratt also show the same type of head.

Larry Surface, Ohio Night Cam BF photo

Harvey Pratt Forensic Artist drawing of Eastern Bigfoot type

Pennsylvania BF Track resembling Neanderthal tracks but much larger.
Also from a Facebook discussion group about Bigfoot.

Perhaps once in a decade, first indefinable tissue clumps is found on any beach in the world and all the world thinks it is a dinosaur or a giant octopus. In most cases, exposed a rapid examination of the enigmatic DNA chunks of meat as a remnant of a decaying basking shark or Walblubber (adipose tissue). But exceptions prove the rule, for what was at that time in August 1960 found by truly apocalyptic storms on a deserted coast of Tasmania is even leading zoologists still a complete mystery. Both pastoralists Jack boats and Ray Anthony and her employer Ben Fenton drove straight into a secluded area Westtasmaniens their cattle together when they discovered a huge mass of tissue, a large lump of protoplasm, near the River interview. The sea had washed the thing obviously far beyond the flood boundary on land. According to her, it measured a good 6 by 5.4 meters, was about 2 feet tall and weighed an estimated 5 to 10 tons. He showed no signs of decomposition and did not smell. Fenton told some people of the Fund and sketched him, but at first no one seemed very interested. Only one and a half years later, he succeeded GC Cramp, a board member of the Tasmanian Museum, to persuade them to put together a team of zoologists in order to pursue the matter. In the expedition Bruce Mollison and Max Bennett took on the "Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation" (CSIRO) and LE Wall and JA Lewis, members of the "Tasmanian Field Naturalist's Club". Cramp localized the mysterious object from the air and directed the team through the difficult terrain to the discovery site. The expedition reached its destination on 7 March 1962 and noted that the alleged corpse still lay almost exactly where it had been located one and a half years earlier. The researchers reported their findings in Hobart, Tasmania and the front page of the "Mercury" of 9 March 1962 carried the headline "! Seeungeheuerfund could arouse worldwide interest Almost as big as a house" , a drawing of the object was the product and can be seen here: http://www.strangemag.com/globstergifs/ ... anglob.gif An excerpt from the text of the "Mercury": hard and rubbery and extremely well preserved. Gulls, Tasmanian devils, wild cats and crows have for months herumgenagt it and picked, but without success. [...] It was originally covered with fine hairs that were compared by the shepherds with greasy wool. [...] The animal had a hump in front of about 1.2 meters in length and gradually slimmed down to "back" down to about 15 centimeters. In the front area were located on each side of 5 or 6 gill-like, hairless slots. Front 4 large, pendulous lobes were visible, and between the central pair, there was a smooth, maw-like opening. Expedition members discovered no visible eyes, ears nor a defined head or a recognizable bone structure. The meat was off-white, fibrous, and surrounded by a thick, hard and extremely resistant skin. Mollison, leader of the ground troops said at the time: "There is a tendency always to believe not that one is faced with an unknown animal Man is always looking for some explanation and tries everything piece together reasonable, but here can piece together is nothing [.... .] The more I looked, the more I was convinced that this is not originated from a known animal. " On 16 March 1962 sent the Australian government - from a second expedition to investigate the find - a little surprised by the worldwide publicity of the story. This time participants were scientists from various faculties, including again some of the CSIRO. The discovery had now also received a name: "Globster". The researchers took a tissue sample and brought it to Hobart, where they could not agree on the identity of the corpse. Professor AM Clark of the University of Tasmania was the discovery of the remains of a huge stingray. Anyway, it was in his eyes not a whale. A whale bears under the skin, an insulating layer of fat called blubber, which can be peeled in the course of decay and has frequently led to misinterpretations been washed up fabric scraps. A 5 to 10 ton, solid mass without bones and muscles like the Tasmanian Globster has nothing to do with Walblubber. Mollison said during an interview, the "monster" was "neither fish nor fowl" was. "It was not a whale, no seal, no elephant seal and not a squid." The Australian government finally decided that it must have been a whale. Senator John Gorton commented in this regard quite short: "In layman's terms, and in light of the scientifically careful formulation, says the report, that the monster is a big lump of rotting blubber, which was peeled off probably by a whale." In later conversations said Bruce Mollison: "Its meat is [...] rubber-like, either by fire or by various chemical substances destructible. Yet it is not rubber, any meat in the traditional sense, no flesh. It is something that defies any classification in a scheme . [...] I hacked with a hunting knife in the ivory-colored meat, but it was too tough to dislodge a decent chunk. It was like thick leather. " It appears that the Australian Government has not sufficiently before its official statement on the Fund informed. Boneless, of fibrous, durable and consistent with gill slits, it was certainly not a whale. So What was behind the mysterious Tasmanian Globster? He does not seem to do not fit into the known classification of the animal kingdom. For some reason there are no veil-like photographs of the carcass - all that remains for us is, sketches, reports and logs. . The track of the object itself is lost also in the dark, Ivan T. Sanderson reported in 1972 in "Saga's UFO Special" about the find and wrote: "We have destroyed a creature from outer space?" The idea of giant protoplasmic chunks that without land use of a spaceship on Earth is fascinating, but we should settle on the list of possible explanations quite far down ... The Tasmanian Globster represents one of the most mysterious cases of cryptozoology, he is still a mystery and is probably without the discovery of a second representative of its type remain such also.

A really old thread. Blow Let's dust off a little and correct some: The expert was LE Wall in the Journal Tasmanian Naturalist ( The Tasmanian Naturalist 127: 20-41 ) in 1981 identified as a whale, which confirmed an electron microscopic examination of samples (Pierce, S., S. Massey, N. Curtis, G. Smith, C. & T. Olavarría Maugel 2004 Microscopic, Biochemical, and Molecular Characteristics of the Chilean Blob and a Comparison With the Remains of Other Sea Monsters:. Nothing but Whales. Biological Bulletin 206 : 125-133 .) reason this update is an old movie of Globsters that I found today.

Microscopic, Biochemical, and Molecular

Characteristics of the Chilean Blob and a Comparison

With the Remains of Other Sea Monsters:

Nothing but Whales

SIDNEY K. PIERCE

1,*, STEVEN E. MASSEY1, NICHOLAS E. CURTIS1,

GERALD N. SMITH, JR.

2, CARLOS OLAVARRI´A3, AND TIMOTHY K. MAUGEL4

1

Department of Biology, University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida 33620; 2 Department of

Medicine, Division of Rheumatology, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, Indiana